Trufant decision looming without any practice time

It’s decision week for the Seattle Seahawks and one of the toughest choices — what to do with Marcus Trufant — will most likely have to be made without seeing what the team’s best cornerback is ready to do on the football field.

Coach Jim Mora said Monday that the chances of Trufant practicing this week are “not good,” which means there’ll be no eyeballing the cornerback’s sore back in action before final roster determinations must be made Saturday.

Marcus Trufant

The Seahawks can either keep Trufant on the Physically Unable to Perform list, which makes him ineligible to play for the first six games of the regular season, or use one of their 53 final roster spots and hope he’ll be ready some time during that span.

“We’ll take it right down to the wire,” Mora said. “We won’t make that decision until we absolutely have to and we’ll do it with a lot of input from our doctors and our training staff and Marcus himself.

“Hopefully it’s not a hard decision. Hopefully it’s a positive decision. But we’ll have to see. … We’re going to have to think really hard about that one as a staff and organization.”

No worries with Edge: Mora is much less concerned about another player who likely won’t get any game evaluation prior to Saturday. Veteran running back Edgerrin James saw some action in practice Monday, but there’s no rush to see if he’ll be ready to play in Thursday’s preseason finale against Oakland.

“We haven’t talked about that,” Mora said of whether James will get any action against the Raiders. “If he feels comfortable and wants to get a couple carries, we’ll get that done.

“But this is a guy who is the 11th-leading rusher in the history of the National Football League. I think if he went into the Rams game (on Sept. 13) without a carry, it wouldn’t be a big deal. People have seen a lot of Edgerrin James. As long as he’s comfortable, that’s the big thing.”

Different story with the rookie: Mora said his starters will see limited time in the preseason finale, but one who’ll get some run is first-round draft pick Aaron Curry.

“He’ll get some reps Thursday night for sure because he needs it,” Mora said. “He’s not like Edge. He’s not the 10th-leading tackler or sacker in the history of the NFL. But I like the way he’s coming along, especially for a guy who was late to camp and then missed a week. He’s done a nice job absorbing the information.”

Coming down to the wire: Thursday’s game will provide the final evaluation in some position battles and Mora said he looks forward to the game for that reason alone.

“After a long offseason and a long minicamp and three preseason games, you’d think all the decisions have been made,” he said. “But they really haven’t been. There are just some races that are too close to call. So this week is very important.”

Brandon Coutu

Asked about the battle at placekicker between Olindo Mare and Brandon Coutu, Mora at first said “it’s real close” and then amended himself.

“It’s neck and neck, how about that?” he said. “That’s a better cliche.”

Mora obviously wasn’t pleased with the kicking outcome Saturday in Kansas City when Mare missed twice and Coutu once, but said that didn’t all fall at their feet.

“We need to make field goals,” he said. “The operation between the snap and hold and kick and protection has to be exact. It has to be perfect. And it wasn’t.”

One must go: The Seahawks still have 76 players on their roster, meaning one cut must be made by Tuesday’s deadline to 75. The final cut to 53 is then due Saturday.

The practice closed with two-minute drills by the first- and second-team offenses both ending in end-zone interceptions by cornerback Kelly Jennings, the first off Matt Hasselbeck and the second by Mike Teel, who was working in place of Seneca Wallace with the backups.